Blender Tutorial: Geometry Nodes for Beginners - Part 1
Summary
TLDRThis tutorial introduces Geometry Nodes in Blender, a powerful tool for artists to create complex 3D models with ease. The instructor walks through the basics, explaining how Geometry Nodes function as a modifier and can be used to manipulate mesh data. The video demonstrates creating a sugar-coated candy effect on a cube by scattering points and using them to instance smaller cube objects, which represent sugar crystals. Key concepts like joining nodes, applying transformations, and randomizing properties are covered, providing a foundation for more advanced Geometry Nodes techniques.
Takeaways
- 🎨 **Geometry Nodes as Artist-Friendly Programming:** The script introduces Geometry Nodes as a tool that allows artists to perform actions based on defined rules, enabling the creation of complex or previously impossible designs.
- 📚 **Learning the Basics:** It emphasizes the importance of learning the core functionality of Geometry Nodes, which is the focus of the tutorial series.
- 🔧 **Geometry Nodes as Modifiers:** The script explains that Geometry Nodes function as modifiers in Blender, similar to others, and their order in the stack matters.
- 📦 **Understanding the Geometry Nodes System:** It's described as a post-processing tool for meshes, where the input is the mesh and the output is the result of the node operations.
- 🔄 **Transforming Meshes:** The tutorial demonstrates how to use Geometry Nodes to transform meshes, such as moving, rotating, and scaling, without actually altering the mesh data.
- 🍬 **Practical Application:** The script outlines a practical application of Geometry Nodes by creating a sugar-coated candy effect on a cube.
- 🔍 **Using the Spreadsheet:** It mentions the spreadsheet, a feature that shows the coordinates of vertices and faces, which is useful in specific cases but can be hidden for simplicity.
- 🔗 **Connecting Nodes:** The process of connecting nodes is explained, highlighting the importance of matching colors to ensure data flows correctly.
- 🌐 **Scattering Points on Faces:** The tutorial covers how to scatter points on the faces of a mesh using the 'Distribute Points on Faces' node.
- 🔄 **Joining Geometry:** It introduces the 'Join Geometry' node, which allows for multiple inputs to be combined into a single output, a powerful feature for complex setups.
Q & A
What is Geometry Nodes in Blender?
-Geometry Nodes is a node-based system in Blender that allows artists to create and manipulate geometry through a visual programming interface, enabling complex tasks and custom tools for faster production.
Why should artists learn the basics of Geometry Nodes?
-Artists should learn the basics of Geometry Nodes to expand their capabilities, enabling them to create effects and tools that were previously impossible or difficult, thus streamlining their workflow.
How does the order of modifiers affect Geometry Nodes in Blender?
-The order of modifiers in Blender, including Geometry Nodes, matters as they are applied top to bottom. For instance, having a Subsurf modifier before or after Geometry Nodes will result in different outcomes.
What is the role of the 'Spreadsheet' in Geometry Nodes?
-The 'Spreadsheet' in Geometry Nodes displays the exact coordinates of vertices and faces, which is useful in specific cases but is often hidden as it can be overwhelming for most users.
How does the 'Join Geometry' node function in Geometry Nodes?
-The 'Join Geometry' node allows users to combine multiple geometry inputs into a single output, which can be used for various purposes, such as using the same mesh data for rendering and creating points.
What is the purpose of the 'Distribute Points on Faces' node?
-The 'Distribute Points on Faces' node scatters points across the surface of a mesh, which can be used as a basis for more complex operations, such as creating detailed textures or particle systems.
Why is it necessary to apply transformations in Geometry Nodes?
-Transformations such as scale, rotation, and location must be applied in Geometry Nodes by pressing Ctrl+A to ensure that the modified values are used correctly in subsequent nodes and operations.
How does the 'Instance on Points' node work in Geometry Nodes?
-The 'Instance on Points' node replaces the scattered points with instances of another object, which can be used to create effects like scattering objects across a surface.
What is the significance of the 'Random Value' node in creating random rotations?
-The 'Random Value' node generates random values between zero and one, which can be used to create random rotations for each instance on points by plugging it into the rotation inputs of the 'Instance on Points' node.
Why are radians used in Geometry Nodes for rotations?
-Radians are used in Geometry Nodes for rotations because they are a standard unit in mathematical calculations. One radian is approximately 57.29 degrees, and using radians allows for precise and consistent mathematical operations.
How can you ensure that instances maintain a cubic shape when scaling?
-To ensure that instances maintain a cubic shape when scaling, use the 'Random Value' node to generate random float values and connect it to the scale input of the 'Instance on Points' node, making sure all axes use the same scale value.
Outlines
🎨 Introduction to Geometry Nodes
The paragraph introduces Geometry Nodes as a user-friendly programming tool in Blender that allows artists to perform actions based on defined rules, enabling the creation of complex or previously impossible designs. It emphasizes the importance of learning the basics, which is the focus of the video series. The tutorial begins with a new scene and guides viewers through accessing the Geometry Nodes tab, explaining the initial setup involving a 3D viewport and the 'spreadsheet' that displays vertex and face coordinates. The instructor suggests hiding the spreadsheet and demonstrates how to apply a Geometry Nodes system to a cube, introducing the concept of modifiers and their order. The core functionality of Geometry Nodes is likened to post-processing for meshes, with an example of how to transform the cube using the nodes without altering the original mesh.
🍭 Creating a Candy-like Texture with Geometry Nodes
This section delves into using Geometry Nodes to create a sugar scattering system on a cube to mimic a lollipop or candy appearance. The tutorial explains how to add nodes and connect them correctly, focusing on the 'Distribute Points on Faces' node to scatter points across the cube's surface. The instructor discusses the rendering of points and introduces the 'Join Geometry' node to use the cube data twice—once for rendering and once for scattering points. The 'Instance on Point' node is then used to replace the scattered points with an object, in this case, a smaller cube referred to as a 'sugar crystal.' The process of scaling down the sugar crystal, applying the scale, and ensuring it is correctly referenced in the Geometry Nodes is also covered, setting the stage for creating a detailed candy texture.
🔄 Randomization and Transformation in Geometry Nodes
The final paragraph focuses on adding randomness and variation to the scattered objects using Geometry Nodes. It starts with the use of the 'Random Value' node to generate random rotation values for each sugar crystal, explaining the difference between radians and degrees and how to adjust the rotation range. The tutorial then moves on to scaling, where it's important to maintain the cube shape of the sugar crystals by using the same random value for all axes. The concept of 'tau' (2π) is introduced to create a full rotation range. The paragraph concludes with a teaser for the next part of the series, which promises to explore more advanced features of Geometry Nodes.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Geometry Nodes
💡Modifiers
💡Spreadsheet
💡Post Processing
💡Transform
💡Distribute Points on Faces
💡Instance on Points
💡Random Value
💡Tau (2π)
💡Join Geometry
Highlights
Geometry nodes allow artists to perform actions based on defined rules, enabling the creation of previously impossible designs or tools for faster production.
Every artist should learn the basics of geometry nodes for core functionality understanding.
The tutorial begins by opening a new scene and accessing the geometry nodes tab.
The spreadsheet, showing exact coordinates of vertices and faces, is introduced but deemed not essential for the tutorial.
Geometry nodes are modifiers that affect the mesh, and their order in the modifier stack matters.
The concept of input and output in geometry nodes is explained, demonstrating post-processing for meshes.
A transform node is used to move, rotate, and scale the cube, showing the difference between node operations and actual mesh changes.
The tutorial aims to create a sugar scattering system on a cube to make it look like a lolly or candy.
The 'Distribute Points on Faces' node is used to scatter points on the cube's surface.
The 'Join Geometry' node is introduced to use the cube data twice within the node setup.
The 'Instance on Points' node replaces points with instances of another object, such as sugar crystals.
A new cube is added as a sugar crystal and scaled down to be used as an instance in the node setup.
The importance of applying the scale of an object in geometry nodes before referencing it is discussed.
The 'Random Value' node is used to generate random rotation values for each sugar crystal instance.
The concept of radians is introduced, explaining the difference between degrees and radians in geometry nodes.
The 'Random Value' node is also used to create random scaling for sugar crystals, but keeping them as cubes.
The tutorial concludes with a preview of the sugar crystal effect on the cube, encouraging viewers to join for the next part.
Transcripts
geometry nodes is like artist-friendly
programming letting you perform actions
based on rules that you define and you
can do some crazy things with it create
things that were previously impossible
or build tools to enable faster
production
every artist should learn the basics
which is what this series is all about
you'll leave with an understanding of
how to use the core functionality of
geometry nodes while making a practical
sugar-coated candy let's begin
so with a brand new scene opened up go
to your geometry nodes tab which is at
the top there and when you do that you
will see a familiar 3d viewport on your
top right and then on the left you've
got this scary looking thing you've
never seen before it's called the
spreadsheet
you won't need to use it basically it's
just showing you the exact coordinates
of like vertices and faces and things
you can see the position of it is
changing as i move that vertically there
useful in a handful of cases but really
we don't need it out of sight out of
mind so i'm just going to right click
join these areas so we don't have to
look at it and now i'm going to click on
new and now we have a geometry nodes
system applied to this cube
you will also note you have a modifier
that has been added here called geometry
notes and that is because geometry nodes
are importantly a modifier
and just like any other modifier the
order of it matters whether i have my
subsurf modifier before it or after it
because it will work top to bottom
and also you could actually add another
geometry node system right underneath it
you could have two so it does this one
first and it does this one after it but
generally you only need one
so
this uh system here is the easiest way
to think of geometry nodes is really
like it is post processing for meshes
okay so we've got our input over here
which is our mesh this cube here and
then it's working left to right and then
it's feeding us an output over here so
whatever i put between those two points
it will do as a post-processing step and
let me demonstrate that you don't have
to follow this this is just for
demonstration i'm going to add in a
transform here and i could move the cube
i could
rotate the cube and i could scale the
cube now that looks like i have changed
the object looks like i've changed the
mesh but actually i haven't if you go
into edit mode you can see that the cube
is still there that hasn't changed that
hasn't moved because that part the mesh
part is what is over here it's only this
part here and then this part here which
is then creating and
it's basically doing that operation and
it's using it here as a modifier if i
disable it in the 3d viewport um you can
see that i've still got my original mesh
there right um so that's that's really
the easiest way to to think of geometry
nodes
but you can do a lot more fancier things
with it than just a simple rotation and
scale and things
like for example um we want to do a a
sugar scattering system on our cube and
the cube is then going to become a lolly
we're going to make it look like a lolly
or a candy if you're american or what
not everything has become american we
just call it candy now anyway um the the
node that we are looking for
by the way shift a if you want to add a
node you can also find it here
uh the note that we're looking for
look you've never heard of it before you
wouldn't know which one to use until
you follow a tutorial and then you see
it and honestly that's the easiest way i
think it that's the best way to learn in
my opinion is to not like look up like
in alphabetical order like what does
each of these things do and when do i
need to use it like just you need to
know it when you need to know it so like
try and do things yourself and then like
look up google it you find a screenshot
or a tutorial and then you learn about
that node that sounded complicated or
weird before so in this case we want to
create
scattered objects so we need points so
underneath points we're looking for
distribute points on faces so when you
click
and if i just you can see as i mouse
over this uh this line here
if i just click do a single click it'll
then automatically join it for me now
joining nodes is if you're familiar with
shaders it's roughly the same thing but
you generally want to have the same
color go into the same color so green to
green purple purple etc there are
exceptions to that and we'll talk about
that later but that's just a general uh
rule so what this has done is it has
taken our mesh data of a cube and it
said okay instead of the mesh you want
to see points and it has now scattered
points on that and you can see if i
increase the density there it looks like
the shape of my cube
okay cool i can do i can do really cool
things with these points i could do
animations i could make them fall i
could do everything but this is just you
know the the most basic form of it now
we actually want to have not just the
points by themselves because if i if i
was to render actually i would get
nothing
because points don't actually render
they're just for the 3d viewport until
you reference them and tell them what to
render them as
i
as well as these points i want to see
the cube so i want to use
the cube data twice and i can do that
with another node that you'll need all
the time which is join geometry shift a
join geometry by the way if you can't
ever remember which which menu it is
under if you just go up to search and
then just type in join or whatever it is
you're looking for you can find it that
way as well so if i drop this in here
after my points on faces you can see
this input here is different it's longer
than these other ones and this is
actually a new concept for geometry
nodes this didn't used to exist but this
will let you put in as many inputs as
you want into this so i can for example
i can take my output of my original cube
data and put it in here which is it's to
me that's pretty cool it's like it's
using the cube data twice it's using it
for rendering the cube and it's also
just taking removing the cube data
replacing it with points and then it's
using that as well and it's combining it
into one which is very cool
so um that's great now again if i was to
render this i wouldn't see those points
because they do not render unless you
tell them what to render as so to do
that we need another node
right after here not before but after it
points we're looking for
points no not points sorry instances
instance on
point not two points completely separate
uh instance on
points someone's honking their horn
right outside all right if i was to drop
this in here you can see the points of
vanish because now it has you're saying
replace those points with whatever is in
the instance right here and we've got
nothing in there right now
so we need another object we need to put
an object into this instance here and we
want them to look like sugar crystals
sugar crystals are basically little
cubes you can by the way you could if
you were fancy you could use cube
whereas mesh primitives you could add in
a cube if you want to but we want to
bevel it later and you know it's just
helpful if it's its own object so i'm
going to in the 3d viewport add another
cube and let's just move this to the
side and i also want to scale it down so
that it's much smaller than this so i'll
just scale this and i'm going to type in
point one so s point one and then enter
and then it will scale it to uh
a tenth of the size okay i have to make
sure i'm like ten to one percent no ten
percent anyways all right also you'll
know by the way if you click on another
object like a camera a lamp or anything
like that the geometry nodes have
vanished and that's because it will by
default it'll only show you what is
selected and it'll also only show you
what's selected in your modifier stack
there if you don't want to have to keep
like searching for your object in order
to see this if you click that pin icon
there then that will pin this here no
matter what is selected this will always
be here until i unpin that so we want to
have that pinned all right so i'm going
to rename this cube here
sugar
crystal
and then i want to reference this in my
geometry node setup down here so i can
do that very simply i love that you can
do this now in blender just click from
my outliner down here
into this node setup and it's now
automatically created an object info
node with that object selected which is
pretty cool all right so i want to
reference this into the instance so you
can probably guess so let's just make
this a little bit bigger
we're going to go green to green
geometry to instance haha
all right now that we've done that um
you can see that it it's doing something
but it's not working the way that we had
hoped and that is because when we added
in this cube and we scaled it down when
you've scaled something down it's not
referencing it in your geometry nodes or
everywhere else in blender perhaps until
you have applied the scale of that so i
did this deliberately just so that you
could see the scale of this is still 0.1
so we need to apply it by hitting
control a and then hit scale and now
those values are one and now it's
referencing it correctly
right so if i was to adjust this uh
density here you can see that i can
choose how many sugar crystals do i want
to appear on my uh my cube it doesn't
look very detailed yet we'll get there
and that value will change it there
which is cool
all right now
it currently looks like i don't know
like a
lazy spaceship you know like how they
used to do like grebel on uh on
spaceships and things for like old
animations and it was just like blocky
shapes um we want this to look like
sugar crystals which are clinging on and
those have to be rotated so each of
these little cubes that we want to be
rotated now there is a rotation value
here in this instance on points but if
we were to change this it's changing all
of the points one by one whereas we want
to create a random value for each of
those points
so for that we need another node that
you will use all the time as well and
that is let's just move this up
shift a
utilities random value again you can
also search for it random if you can
never uh remember what it is random
value
and does what it says on the tin random
value generates a random value between
in this case zero and one
now this is a float a float is a single
number
and that's a gray output a single number
whereas rotation is three it's three
axes x a y and a z so you could actually
connect this into it like that and you
would get rotation but you would see
that you've got kind of like a pattern
right like they're all kind of
rotating almost to the same sort of
thing and it's because like let's say
it's generating a value of like for one
of these points like point two it's
rotating it at exactly
you know
0.2.2.2 or you know whatever like that
for all three of the axes which is not
actually what we want we want each axis
to have its own value independently so
instead of float what i'm looking for is
vector okay so now if i drop this in
here you can see we get a lot more
values
because there's three there's three
there's the min for each of the three
axes x y and z and x y and z for the max
but now that we've got that you can see
that we've got a lot more
uh random rotation happening right
um now the other thing to note is like
okay one is that one degree it looks
like it's more than one degree what is
going on this this value here these are
actually
radians
that's right radians what is a radian a
radian is
57.29
degrees all right it's a mathematical
concept and geometry nodes is generally
mathematical so it's you just have to
get used to it there's like a lot of
math functions and things like that when
it comes to geometry knows
and radians is one of them so this is
not one degree it is one radian which is
about 57 so it is giving us a random
value between 0 and 57-ish degrees if we
set this to 2 it's a little bit more
right it's giving us a little bit more
rotation but again it's not 360. it's
360. it's like you could actually type
in pi
pi would be 180 right because it's uh
3.142 it would be uh yeah it's half of
it but actually we want double pi so if
you wanted to you could type in two
times pi or there's a word for that
which is called
tau
which i didn't know was a word until i
needed it for this exact thing um and
arendelle uh erindale's youtube channel
everyone should subscribe if you want to
go deep into geometry nodes like really
deep um he's the master of it um but tau
towers twice pi it's the full
circumference or whatever of the
circle i should pay attention to math
shouldn't i um anyway
um and just quickly for environments
like if you were say scattering some
photo scan rocks from polygon or you're
building an environment in those cases
you would actually want to rotate on
every on only the z-axis anyways all
right so now let's do these scales so
i'm going to duplicate my random value
here and i'm going to plug this into my
scale
now in the case of scale
uh different to our rotation
we don't want to have um separate values
for our
x y and our z because we might get
something that is not a cube shape right
this looks like they're the same value
but remember each it's generating a
value like in between those right so
you'll get some that are like
rectangular prisms and things so we want
to keep it as a cube but yeah just like
different values of the cube so for that
we want to change it back to float and
then plug that into scale and now they
all stay as cubes but just different
values in there
now i would never have the minimum set
as 0 because then that could technically
be a value which you would not be able
to see but it would still be rendering
so i'm just going to make it just a
little bit more yeah you can see it's
exactly what it's doing there's like a
cube that's like invisible
so yeah i just make it a little bit more
than zero and then it comes through and
there you go and you can see now that
we've got that we've got the sizing that
looks pretty good if we cranked up our
density there you can sort of see what
we're getting at with this tutorial
so we've learned about the basics of
geometry nodes go ahead join me in the
next part as we delve a little more
deeper into some of the idiosyncrasies
so click here on the screen and i'll see
you there
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